Genesis is part of your summer reading assignment. Here are some questions to consider as you read:
1.You will notice that there are in fact two accounts of the creation, the first running from Genesis 1.1 to the middle of 2.4, the second from that point on. What important differences are there in the two accounts? 2. As well as two accounts of the creation, there are two versions of the flood, and two different ways of referring to God. Many scholars think that Genesis is the result of two different accounts being combined. What other evidence of two different sources do you see? Consider tone of voice, word choice, sentence length, and other aspects of voice. 3.How many different aspects of humanity does the Adam and Eve story explain? What is the nature of God in the story, and the relationship of man and God? What are the differences between Adam and Eve? Is the snake just a snake? Notice that Genesis says that God created the snake/serpent. How does that affect the way we see the snake? Is it fair to call the snake the devil if God created it? Finally, what exactly is meant by "knowledge of good and evil"? Why should that knowledge be displeasing to God? 4.What are the essential points of the Cain and Abel story? of the Flood story? of the Babel story? of the Abraham and Isaac story? All of these stories in some way depict relationships between God and humans, or between humans. How are humans divided from the divine? from each other? 5. The first family, on being expelled from the Garden, goes to dwell on the "East of Eden." Later, Cain takes a bride from the "Land of Nod." Where did the other folks come from? How does their presence affect the creation story? 6.The idea of Babel has been alluded to in literature. Recently, a movie by this name won Golden Globe and Academy awards. How does the Biblical story relate to the film?7. The story of Abraham's readiness to sacrifice his son Isaac (chapter 22) has had immense influence on later thought and literature. What other stories do you think this story might relate to? Note carefully how sparingly the story is told. What kind of detail is given? What, do you think, is left out?
Mrs. Kruse comments on Genesis:
A REALLY good resource on the Bible is Blogging the Bible by David Plotz who writes for Slate Magazine. He spent some time reading through the entire Bible and blogging it. His section on Genesis is here http://www.slate.com/id/2141712/entry/2141714/
Now, here are my own comments:
June 26:First of all, I'm reading the King James version and I have a copy that has a Concordance-- which really is helpful. A concordance gives all kinds of footnotes and explanations, plus links to other sections of the text that have some sort of connection. So I can look up all kinds of historical and interpretive material as I read. But it really doesn't matter which version you are reading, and there are plenty of versions that are easier to read than King James. The King James version was commissioned by King James of Scotland and England-- the successor to Queen Elizabeth of England. He got together a bunch of well regarded Biblical scholars of the time and got them to do a translation into the most elegant and poetical language they could come up with, so the language is very similar to Shakespearean English because it was written at the same time. Modern scholars have re-translated the books of the Bible, putting it into more contemporary language, and often incorporating archeological knowledge that has been gained since the 1600s If the version you are reading seems to tell you something different than what I'm seeing, be sure to comment!
Now to start with Chapter 1, which has 31 "verses"-- basically 31 sentences. Biblical verses are generally referred to by the book, chapter number and then the verse number: Genesis 1:20
It is interesting to me that in in the first 6 verses, the heaven and earth created seem to be all mushed together, and light and darkness-- Day and Night-- get separated before there is any sun. Then plants and trees get created, but the sun, moon, and stars don't get created until the 4th day.
In verse 26, God says: "Let us make man in our image..." Is the use of us and we supposed to be like the royal we, or is there some plurality implied in God-- is God one thing or more than one? How is it translated in your version? In this chapter, male and female are created at one time on day 6, and there seems to be no distinction between them.God gives the male and female dominion over EVERY living thing. This version says nothing about the Garden of Eden or about restrictions on man or woman. The choice of words is interesting: In verse 28 man is told to "replenish" the earth and to "subdue" it and given "dominion" over every living thing. The contrast between replenishing and subduing seems huge to me. The first word is positive and implies taking care, while the second implies a more negative concept of taming and controlling. Dominion can mean either concept. June 27: Chapter 2-- Interesting to see where the division is between chapters. All of the first chapter was the work of creating. Then chapter two starts with being finished and taking a rest, but then it goes on to do the whole creation thing a second time. But look at how different the second version is. It's so much more mystical, magical-- everything is in the ground before it grew and then a mist comes up out of the ground to water it all instead of the shazam of chapter one.
Then look at how this chapter describes the creation of man-- God formed him out of dust and breathed life into him, and we don't get woman created until quite a bit later. So this is a very different description of creation-- and of the creation of people-- than the first chapter. Here's where we get the Garden of Eden story as well. Instead of describing the creation of plants and animals in the entire world, we get just this one place, which is then very carefully located at the head of 4 rivers)
Spanish-Arabic world map from 1109 CE with Eden in east (at top.
Now version one of the creation gave man and woman complete dominion over every living thing, but in this chapter, God places man in the Garden of Eden and tells him he can't eat of the tree of knowledge of good and evil or he will DIE. (Now, why in the world would God not want humans to know good and evil? ) And after God names Adam, puts him in the garden, tells him he can't eat from the special tree, and lets him name all the animals-- that's when he makes him a Woman. Notice that instead of the first version, when Man and Woman are pretty much equal, this version makes woman from out of the man. Also the first version had God making man and woman in his own image, but there's nothing about that in this second version. The language in this chapter almost seems more conversational to me, also--- none of this "and he saw it was good," phrasing.
The Garden of Eden by Lucas Cranach der Altere, 16th century German Chapter 3-- Wow-- we get into that ancient temptation of Eve story here. But look at the first verse. The serpent was "subtil." My concordance says that the Hebrew is better translated as "cunning" or "crafty." The serpent isn't described as evil. And the verse goes on to say that the serpent was one of the beasts that God made. So how is it that the serpent is usually confused with the devil and the voice of evil, working against God? (Incidentally, the first mention of "devil" or "satan" isn't until MUCH later in the Bible-- the book of Ezekiel, I think.) When Eve talks to the serpent, she tells him she isn't even supposed to touch the tree-- again death is supposed to be the result. But the serpent's response is that if humans know good and evil, they will be like the gods-- notice now we have plural gods--Michealangelo, The Fall
And when Adam and Eve eat the fruit they DON'T die, and interestingly enough, God doesn't automatically know a) where they are and b) that they've disobeyed until they tell him. If God is supposed to be all knowing, all seeing, why didn't he know? And then, why the empty death threat? So the punishment for the serpent is to crawl around in the dirt and to be hated by women (not, curiously, by men though). Eve gets put under Adam's rule and has to go through childbirth. Adam has to work at farming and then God kicks them out of the Garden so that they won't eat of the Tree of Life and become eternally living gods themselves.
One thing that all this reminds me of is the anthropological evidence of very early woman-centered religions which often worshiped snakes. There is a theory that when the patriarchal, male-centered, Hebrew culture gained prominence, ancient stories were changed to make snakes evil and women bad. That's what this chapter looks a lot like to me.
June 28 Chapters 4-10 It's those ever-loving brothers, Cain and Abel. Eve says "I've gotten me a man." Already we have the idea that men are more important than women. Now Cain, the oldest, is a farmer and Abel is a shepherd. So why doesn't God like what Cain brings him? Was there something wrong with it? He doesn't say. Maybe he just doesn't like vegetables. Cain and Abel have a "conversation" and Cain kills Abel? Must have been a doozy of a talk. Again, God acts like he doesn't know what's going on. Then Cain is made into a fugitive, but God marks him so he won't be killed. What kind of retribution is that? And off goes Cain to the EAST OF EDEN (yes, Steinbeck's title is a direct allusion here) which is the land of Nod. So what would be east of Eden? India? China? There are lots of theories.
And Cain somehow gets himself a wife-- where did she come from? Is she a sister that hasn't been mentioned, or were there other folks that had been created? Then Cain has lots of kids who specialize in all different occupations-- sort of like the gods on Mt Olympus or the Norse pantheon. One of these guys marries two women and then kills a couple guys. Again, where are these folks coming from? So supposedly all the people in the world are descended from Cain until Adam and Eve have another boy, Seth. No girls are mentioned. Now, if Adam and Eve are the originals, then everyone else is marrying or killing siblings. That's all way too incestuous for me!
Chapter 5 gives us the Family history of the Adam and Eve clan as descended through little Seth, and we are back at the creation story of chapter 1 where both Adam and Eve are created together-- and they are BOTH called Adam-- the original Adams family.
These guys all live a LONG time-- 900+ years.
Chapter 6-- Here's something odd. Men multiply on the earth and have pretty daughters, so the "sons of God" marry them. So does God have some sons? Who are they? Verse 4 says there were "giants in the earth." The daughters of men and the sons of God have "mighty men" for kids. Then all of a sudden, God doesn't like man any more--he's "wicked." But I thought man was formed in God's image. So God is going to destroy everything, but for some reason he decides he likes Noah and gives him explicit boat building plans. A cubit is 25 inches. So the ark is 625 feet long, 104 feet wide and 621/2 feet tall. My concordance says, no sweat, the boat would hold everything easily- it's as big as 600 frieght cars. But I don't know that I buy that it's big enough for two of every animal plus food for everything for a year. No seeds, by the way. Are all the plants supposed to be flood tolerant? Noah's Ark by Edward Hicks Chapter 7--we get a slightly different version here. Noah gets to take 7 of each of the "clean" animals. So what are clean animals? He gets 7 days warning and then 40 days and nights of rain. Why 40? Notice we have an exact time: the 17th day of the 2nd month of Noah's 600th year. There's no respect for a senior citizen! The water is 15 cubits deep-- that's just over 30 feet. And that covers the mountains? The flood lasts 150 days. Then again with the 17th of the month-- this time the 7th month. The ark rests on the mountains of Ararat, but it's two and a half more months until the mountains are seen. Again we've got a 40 day thing. Noah sends out a raven that just flies around, and he sends a dove out 3 times with 7 days between. Threes and sevens are power numbers in mythology. Forty seems to be significant also. So God says he's not going to destroy the earth again. Then in Chapter 9 we get another version of the end of the flood and God telling Noah to go out and repopulate the earth. There's also a dietary law here about bloody meat and out of the blue a statement about not shedding the blood of other men. Here's where we get the rainbow as a sign that God won't destroy the world again. Then Noah starts growing grapes, makes some wine, and gets naked and drunk in his tent. His youngest kid sees him and then gets cursed because he saw his dad naked? How weird is that? It's fine that Noah gets naked and drunk, but horrible that his son saw him?
Chapter 10 goes through all of Noah's descendents-- Now everyone on earth is supposed to be descended from Noah-- and how they've broken up into different countries. Those three sons and their wives were awfully busy having enough kids to break into nations in what, twenty generations? June 29 Chapters 11-20. 11: The Tower of Babel. God makes everyone have different languages because if they all speak the same language they'll be able to accomplish anything they want-- so God wants to limit man and keep people form working together? 12: We meet Abram and Sarai who do a lot of moving around mostly on the promise of getting some land. Is it in short supply? When they go to Egypt, Abram pretends Sarai's his sister. So why does the Pharoah get punished with plagues when he shows interest in Sarai? Pharoah gets cursed, but Abram gets a bunch of land for lying? 14: I guess we're supposed to see Abram as a really good guy since he rescued Lot and the king of Sodom and wouldn't take a reward.
God keeps making promises to Abram about his descendants-- that has to be a bit irritating since Abram and Sarai don't have any kids. So is it really Sarai's idea to give her maid, Hagar, to Abram? And why is she surprised when Hagar gets uppity? I don't think I'd be real excited to have some angel tell me to go back and be Sarai's maid or that my son, Ishmael, was going to be "wild" and in conflict with everyone. Right on cue, here comes God again promising land to Abram and Sarai's descendants as long as all the guys get circumcised. Such a little thing! Sarah will get to have a kid even though she's 90 and Ishmael will become the father of 12 princes. Well, for that, of course everyone gets circumcised. (Oh-- and they change their names to Sarah and Abraham. Why is that?)
In chapter 18, there's a slightly different version of the story in which in almost sounds like Sarah's pregnancy is in thanks for hospitality to God who appears as 3 young men-- there's that magical 3 again. Now the next part, about Sodom and Gomorrah has me confused. Two angels come to town and Lot insists on their coming in to dinner. Then a mob forms around the house and wants the angels, "that we may know them." My concordance says that means the mob wants to use them sexually. That really doesn't make sense to me, but then Lot's offering of his virgin daughters to the mob seems horrific. So all those nasty folks get blinded, the city gets destroyed, and Lot & family get to escape. Why isn't Lot's pimping of his daughters regarded as nasty and wicked? Poor Lot's wife-- who just looks back at the destruction of her home and her older, married daughters-- gets turned into a hunk of salt.
Then, truly icky, Lot's daughters get him drunk in a cave and have sex with him! Granted, they think everyone is dead, but really! What an incestuous bunch. So if Lot and his daughters are saved while "wicked" Sodom and Gomorrah are destroyed, it makes you wonder what God really sees as wicked.
June 30 Genesis 21-30: Isaac's name means laughter in Hebrew. I don't much like Sarah or Abraham. They are half siblings but married, they lie to people, Sarah is absolutely mean to Hagar. She sent Hagar to Abraham and now she insists on kicking her and Ishmael out. At least God gives poor Hagar a well which, I guess, is pretty important in a desert culture.
22: The story of the sacrifice of Isaac. So Abraham's willingness to sacrifice his son to God is supposed to show how much he loves God. I don't know what kind of a God puts someone through such a test. What's the point of introducing Abe's brother's family here? 23: Are Sarah and Abraham living apart when she dies? This cave is now-- in real life--an extremely holy Islamic shrine. 24. Abe doesn't want his son marrying a Canaanite girl (what's wrong with Canaanite girls?)-- and it just so happens that the randomly selected girl the servant goes to get for Isaac is his cousin Rebekah, who, of course, goes right off to marry Isaac.
25. What is it with these old guys-- Abraham remarries and he has a bunch of concubines. Male sexuality seems to be a huge theme here. Here's another set of fighting brothers: Rebekah has twins boys who can't even get along in the womb. Esau is red and hairy, and Jacob is smooth--- interesting that the name Jacob means wily and deceitful. Esau is a hunter and Jacob is a tent dweller-- They seem to be representing the "hunter-gatherer" and "farmer" types-- a huge division in ancient anthropology as the farmers were in conflict with the nomadic hunters. These brothers, even more than Cain and Abel, seem to symbolize two major ways of living. The earlier nomadic cultures were largely overpowered by the newer settled cultures, just as Esau is tricked out of his first-born status by Jacob and by his own mother, first with lentil stew and then with a meat dish. (Here's that connection to Lost: Jacob offering the dark hairy guy some food--a fish-- and the hairy guy saying, "No thanks. I already ate.")
Like father, like son. Here's Isaac telling the exact same king Ablimech that Rebekah is his sister, not his wife. Wells and water rights again! Isaac and Rebekah don't like the Hittite girls Esau marries. (So what's wrong with Hittite girls?) Jacob and Rebekah are another pair that aren't very nice-- tricking the blind old Isaac into thinking Jacob is Esau and getting the special blessing of the first-born.Understandably Esau's mad enough to kill his brother. So Jacob goes off to marry a cousin or two and Esau marries a couple of his other cousins. They sure like to keep it all in the family.
Jacob's ladder is something that comes up in a lot of stories-- just a dream about a ladder into heaven. I don't feel too sorry for Jacob. He's been such a trickster, so when Laban tricks him into marrying Leah and having to work 14 years for Rachel, it's kind of payback time. I DO feel sorry for Leah, though. Why does she have to get stuck marrying the guy who wants her sister. Women don't get much choice, it seems. There's a very interesting book called The Red Tent by Anita Diament based on the story of Leah and Rachel and of poor little Dinah, the only daughter mentioned here. Diament is a scholar of
Jewish and Biblical history, so she brings a lot of interesting background into the story.
Chapter 30: When Rachel has Jacob use her made to give her a baby, the sisters and their maids all end up in competition for Jacob's attentions, and for how many of his boys they can produce. It's a bit like a herd of animals. The idea of a child being born to the handmaid on Rachel's thighs is the basis for Margaret Atwood's chilling book, The Handmaid's Tale.
Jacob does some trickery here to finally get away from his father-in-law, but there's some weird superstitions about breeding sheep. Some of this seems to indicate selective breeding, but the deal about cutting stripes into sticks to make the sheep have spots is more magical/sorcery in nature.
August 12 -- sorry for the big gap. I was on vacation. So now to finish up Genesis with chapters 31-50
It's interesting that Jacob explains himself to Rachel and Leah. Rachel stole the statues of the household gods from her father, so many members of the family must still be idol-worshippers. Again with the deceit-- Rachel keeps her father from searching her tent by claiming she's having her period-- a taboo.
The reunion of Jacob and Esau is interesting-- Jacob is sure Esau is going to hate him, but Esau is quite welcoming. We don't really know what has inspired Esau's change of heart except that he has evidently prospered. The wrestling match that Jacob has with God is just weird. What is the point?
Chapter 34 is a pretty terrible story, I think. This is the only daughter of Jacob that is mentioned, and one of the few women. So the prince wasn't very nice in grabbing Dinah and sleeping with her, but then he falls in love and wants to marry her. The prince's dad offers a huge dowry and even consents to have EVERY MAN IN TOWN circumcised. Now that is a pretty big deal, I think. So what happens? The brothers kill all the men, take all the women prisoners and ransack the town. Nasty. Jacob's sons just seem to be a wild and mean spirited crowd. They kill a whole town over their sister's treatment and then turn around and sell Joseph to slavers. So much for honor! Chapter 38 gives a brief explanation for why Catholicism considers masturbation (onanism) a major sin.
The last 11 chapters all deal with Joseph's rise to power in Egypt and how he deals with his brothers afterward. It's an interesting story and contrasts Joseph with his brothers, since Joseph never seems to go for vengeance, and his brothers always expect him to do so-- even when they don't know who he is. So Joseph prospers by forgiving his brothers, and they don't do as well expecting the revenge that has permeated their lives.
Genesis is part of your summer reading assignment. Here are some questions to consider as you read:
1.You will notice that there are in fact two accounts of the creation, the first running from Genesis 1.1 to the middle of 2.4, the second from that point on. What important differences are there in the two accounts? 2. As well as two accounts of the creation, there are two versions of the flood, and two different ways of referring to God. Many scholars think that Genesis is the result of two different accounts being combined. What other evidence of two different sources do you see? Consider tone of voice, word choice, sentence length, and other aspects of voice. 3.How many different aspects of humanity does the Adam and Eve story explain? What is the nature of God in the story, and the relationship of man and God? What are the differences between Adam and Eve? Is the snake just a snake? Notice that Genesis says that God created the snake/serpent. How does that affect the way we see the snake? Is it fair to call the snake the devil if God created it? Finally, what exactly is meant by "knowledge of good and evil"? Why should that knowledge be displeasing to God? 4.What are the essential points of the Cain and Abel story? of the Flood story? of the Babel story? of the Abraham and Isaac story? All of these stories in some way depict relationships between God and humans, or between humans. How are humans divided from the divine? from each other?
5. The first family, on being expelled from the Garden, goes to dwell on the "East of Eden." Later, Cain takes a bride from the "Land of Nod." Where did the other folks come from? How does their presence affect the creation story? 6.The idea of Babel has been alluded to in literature. Recently, a movie by this name won Golden Globe and Academy awards. How does the Biblical story relate to the film?7. The story of Abraham's readiness to sacrifice his son Isaac (chapter 22) has had immense influence on later thought and literature. What other stories do you think this story might relate to? Note carefully how sparingly the story is told. What kind of detail is given? What, do you think, is left out?
Mrs. Kruse comments on Genesis:
A REALLY good resource on the Bible is Blogging the Bible by David Plotz who writes for Slate Magazine. He spent some time reading through the entire Bible and blogging it. His section on Genesis is here
http://www.slate.com/id/2141712/entry/2141714/
Now, here are my own comments:
June 26: First of all, I'm reading the King James version and I have a copy that has a Concordance-- which really is helpful. A concordance gives all kinds of footnotes and explanations, plus links to other sections of the text that have some sort of connection. So I can look up all kinds of historical and interpretive material as I read. But it really doesn't matter which version you are reading, and there are plenty of versions that are easier to read than King James. The King James version was commissioned by King James of Scotland and England-- the successor to Queen Elizabeth of England. He got together a bunch of well regarded Biblical scholars of the time and got them to do a translation into the most elegant and poetical language they could come up with, so the language is very similar to Shakespearean English because it was written at the same time. Modern scholars have re-translated the books of the Bible, putting it into more contemporary language, and often incorporating archeological knowledge that has been gained since the 1600s If the version you are reading seems to tell you something different than what I'm seeing, be sure to comment!
Now to start with Chapter 1, which has 31 "verses"-- basically 31 sentences. Biblical verses are generally referred to by the book, chapter number and then the verse number: Genesis 1:20
It is interesting to me that in in the first 6 verses, the heaven and earth created seem to be all mushed together, and light and darkness-- Day and Night-- get separated before there is any sun. Then plants and trees get created, but the sun, moon, and stars don't get created until the 4th day.
In verse 26, God says: "Let us make man in our image..." Is the use of us and we supposed to be like the royal we, or is there some plurality implied in God-- is God one thing or more than one? How is it translated in your version? In this chapter, male and female are created at one time on day 6, and there seems to be no distinction between them.God gives the male and female dominion over EVERY living thing. This version says nothing about the Garden of Eden or about restrictions on man or woman. The choice of words is interesting: In verse 28 man is told to "replenish" the earth and to "subdue" it and given "dominion" over every living thing. The contrast between replenishing and subduing seems huge to me. The first word is positive and implies taking care, while the second implies a more negative concept of taming and controlling. Dominion can mean either concept.
June 27: Chapter 2-- Interesting to see where the division is between chapters. All of the first chapter was the work of creating. Then chapter two starts with being finished and taking a rest, but then it goes on to do the whole creation thing a second time. But look at how different the second version is. It's so much more mystical, magical-- everything is in the ground before it grew and then a mist comes up out of the ground to water it all instead of the shazam of chapter one.
Then look at how this chapter describes the creation of man-- God formed him out of dust and breathed life into him, and we don't get woman created until quite a bit later. So this is a very different description of creation-- and of the creation of people-- than the first chapter. Here's where we get the Garden of Eden story as well. Instead of describing the creation of plants and animals in the entire world, we get just this one place, which is then very carefully located at the head of 4 rivers)
Spanish-Arabic world map from 1109 CE with Eden in east (at top
Now version one of the creation gave man and woman complete dominion over every living thing, but in this chapter, God places man in the Garden of Eden and tells him he can't eat of the tree of knowledge of good and evil or he will DIE. (Now, why in the world would God not want humans to know good and evil? ) And after God names Adam, puts him in the garden, tells him he can't eat from the special tree, and lets him name all the animals-- that's when he makes him a Woman. Notice that instead of the first version, when Man and Woman are pretty much equal, this version makes woman from out of the man. Also the first version had God making man and woman in his own image, but there's nothing about that in this second version. The language in this chapter almost seems more conversational to me, also--- none of this "and he saw it was good," phrasing.
Chapter 3-- Wow-- we get into that ancient temptation of Eve story here. But look at the first verse. The serpent was "subtil." My concordance says that the Hebrew is better translated as "cunning" or "crafty." The serpent isn't described as evil. And the verse goes on to say that the serpent was one of the beasts that God made. So how is it that the serpent is usually confused with the devil and the voice of evil, working against God? (Incidentally, the first mention of "devil" or "satan" isn't until MUCH later in the Bible-- the book of Ezekiel, I think.) When Eve talks to the serpent, she tells him she isn't even supposed to touch the tree-- again death is supposed to be the result. But the serpent's response is that if humans know good and evil, they will be like the gods-- notice now we have plural gods--
And when Adam and Eve eat the fruit they DON'T die, and interestingly enough, God doesn't automatically know a) where they are and b) that they've disobeyed until they tell him. If God is supposed to be all knowing, all seeing, why didn't he know? And then, why the empty death threat? So the punishment for the serpent is to crawl around in the dirt and to be hated by women (not, curiously, by men though). Eve gets put under Adam's rule and has to go through childbirth. Adam has to work at farming and then God kicks them out of the Garden so that they won't eat of the Tree of Life and become eternally living gods themselves.
One thing that all this reminds me of is the anthropological evidence of very early woman-centered religions which often worshiped snakes. There is a theory that when the patriarchal, male-centered, Hebrew culture gained prominence, ancient stories were changed to make snakes evil and women bad. That's what this chapter looks a lot like to me.
June 28 Chapters 4-10 It's those ever-loving brothers, Cain and Abel. Eve says "I've gotten me a man." Already we have the idea that men are more important than women. Now Cain, the oldest, is a farmer and Abel is a shepherd. So why doesn't God like what Cain brings him? Was there something wrong with it? He doesn't say. Maybe he just doesn't like vegetables. Cain and Abel have a "conversation" and Cain kills Abel? Must have been a doozy of a talk. Again, God acts like he doesn't know what's going on. Then Cain is made into a fugitive, but God marks him so he won't be killed. What kind of retribution is that? And off goes Cain to the EAST OF EDEN (yes, Steinbeck's title is a direct allusion here) which is the land of Nod. So what would be east of Eden? India? China? There are lots of theories.
And Cain somehow gets himself a wife-- where did she come from? Is she a sister that hasn't been mentioned, or were there other folks that had been created? Then Cain has lots of kids who specialize in all different occupations-- sort of like the gods on Mt Olympus or the Norse pantheon. One of these guys marries two women and then kills a couple guys. Again, where are these folks coming from? So supposedly all the people in the world are descended from Cain until Adam and Eve have another boy, Seth. No girls are mentioned. Now, if Adam and Eve are the originals, then everyone else is marrying or killing siblings. That's all way too incestuous for me!
Chapter 5 gives us the Family history of the Adam and Eve clan as descended through little Seth, and we are back at the creation story of chapter 1 where both Adam and Eve are created together-- and they are BOTH called Adam-- the original Adams family.
These guys all live a LONG time-- 900+ years.
Chapter 6-- Here's something odd. Men multiply on the earth and have pretty daughters, so the "sons of God" marry them. So does God have some sons? Who are they? Verse 4 says there were "giants in the earth." The daughters of men and the sons of God have "mighty men" for kids. Then all of a sudden, God doesn't like man any more--he's "wicked." But I thought man was formed in God's image. So God is going to destroy everything, but for some reason he decides he likes Noah and gives him explicit boat building plans. A cubit is 25 inches. So the ark is 625 feet long, 104 feet wide and 621/2 feet tall. My concordance says, no sweat, the boat would hold everything easily- it's as big as 600 frieght cars. But I don't know that I buy that it's big enough for two of every animal plus food for everything for a year. No seeds, by the way. Are all the plants supposed to be flood tolerant?
Noah's Ark by Edward Hicks
Chapter 7--we get a slightly different version here. Noah gets to take 7 of each of the "clean" animals. So what are clean animals? He gets 7 days warning and then 40 days and nights of rain. Why 40? Notice we have an exact time: the 17th day of the 2nd month of Noah's 600th year. There's no respect for a senior citizen! The water is 15 cubits deep-- that's just over 30 feet. And that covers the mountains? The flood lasts 150 days. Then again with the 17th of the month-- this time the 7th month. The ark rests on the mountains of Ararat, but it's two and a half more months until the mountains are seen. Again we've got a 40 day thing. Noah sends out a raven that just flies around, and he sends a dove out 3 times with 7 days between. Threes and sevens are power numbers in mythology. Forty seems to be significant also. So God says he's not going to destroy the earth again. Then in Chapter 9 we get another version of the end of the flood and God telling Noah to go out and repopulate the earth. There's also a dietary law here about bloody meat and out of the blue a statement about not shedding the blood of other men. Here's where we get the rainbow as a sign that God won't destroy the world again. Then Noah starts growing grapes, makes some wine, and gets naked and drunk in his tent. His youngest kid sees him and then gets cursed because he saw his dad naked? How weird is that? It's fine that Noah gets naked and drunk, but horrible that his son saw him?
Chapter 10 goes through all of Noah's descendents-- Now everyone on earth is supposed to be descended from Noah-- and how they've broken up into different countries. Those three sons and their wives were awfully busy having enough kids to break into nations in what, twenty generations?
June 29 Chapters 11-20. 11: The Tower of Babel. God makes everyone have different languages because if they all speak the same language they'll be able to accomplish anything they want-- so God wants to limit man and keep people form working together? 12: We meet Abram and Sarai who do a lot of moving around mostly on the promise of getting some land. Is it in short supply? When they go to Egypt, Abram pretends Sarai's his sister. So why does the Pharoah get punished with plagues when he shows interest in Sarai? Pharoah gets cursed, but Abram gets a bunch of land for lying? 14: I guess we're supposed to see Abram as a really good guy since he rescued Lot and the king of Sodom and wouldn't take a reward.
God keeps making promises to Abram about his descendants-- that has to be a bit irritating since Abram and Sarai don't have any kids. So is it really Sarai's idea to give her maid, Hagar, to Abram? And why is she surprised when Hagar gets uppity? I don't think I'd be real excited to have some angel tell me to go back and be Sarai's maid or that my son, Ishmael, was going to be "wild" and in conflict with everyone. Right on cue, here comes God again promising land to Abram and Sarai's descendants as long as all the guys get circumcised. Such a little thing! Sarah will get to have a kid even though she's 90 and Ishmael will become the father of 12 princes. Well, for that, of course everyone gets circumcised. (Oh-- and they change their names to Sarah and Abraham. Why is that?)
In chapter 18, there's a slightly different version of the story in which in almost sounds like Sarah's pregnancy is in thanks for hospitality to God who appears as 3 young men-- there's that magical 3 again. Now the next part, about Sodom and Gomorrah has me confused. Two angels come to town and Lot insists on their coming in to dinner. Then a mob forms around the house and wants the angels, "that we may know them." My concordance says that means the mob wants to use them sexually. That really doesn't make sense to me, but then Lot's offering of his virgin daughters to the mob seems horrific. So all those nasty folks get blinded, the city gets destroyed, and Lot & family get to escape. Why isn't Lot's pimping of his daughters regarded as nasty and wicked? Poor Lot's wife-- who just looks back at the destruction of her home and her older, married daughters-- gets turned into a hunk of salt.
Then, truly icky, Lot's daughters get him drunk in a cave and have sex with him! Granted, they think everyone is dead, but really! What an incestuous bunch. So if Lot and his daughters are saved while "wicked" Sodom and Gomorrah are destroyed, it makes you wonder what God really sees as wicked.
June 30 Genesis 21-30: Isaac's name means laughter in Hebrew. I don't much like Sarah or Abraham. They are half siblings but married, they lie to people, Sarah is absolutely mean to Hagar. She sent Hagar to Abraham and now she insists on kicking her and Ishmael out. At least God gives poor Hagar a well which, I guess, is pretty important in a desert culture.
22: The story of the sacrifice of Isaac. So Abraham's willingness to sacrifice his son to God is supposed to show how much he loves God. I don't know what kind of a God puts someone through such a test. What's the point of introducing Abe's brother's family here? 23: Are Sarah and Abraham living apart when she dies? This cave is now-- in real life--an extremely holy Islamic shrine. 24. Abe doesn't want his son marrying a Canaanite girl (what's wrong with Canaanite girls?)-- and it just so happens that the randomly selected girl the servant goes to get for Isaac is his cousin Rebekah, who, of course, goes right off to marry Isaac.
25. What is it with these old guys-- Abraham remarries and he has a bunch of concubines. Male sexuality seems to be a huge theme here. Here's another set of fighting brothers: Rebekah has twins boys who can't even get along in the womb. Esau is red and hairy, and Jacob is smooth--- interesting that the name Jacob means wily and deceitful. Esau is a hunter and Jacob is a tent dweller-- They seem to be representing the "hunter-gatherer" and "farmer" types-- a huge division in ancient anthropology as the farmers were in conflict with the nomadic hunters. These brothers, even more than Cain and Abel, seem to symbolize two major ways of living. The earlier nomadic cultures were largely overpowered by the newer settled cultures, just as Esau is tricked out of his first-born status by Jacob and by his own mother, first with lentil stew and then with a meat dish. (Here's that connection to Lost: Jacob offering the dark hairy guy some food--a fish-- and the hairy guy saying, "No thanks. I already ate.")
Like father, like son. Here's Isaac telling the exact same king Ablimech that Rebekah is his sister, not his wife. Wells and water rights again! Isaac and Rebekah don't like the Hittite girls Esau marries. (So what's wrong with Hittite girls?) Jacob and Rebekah are another pair that aren't very nice-- tricking the blind old Isaac into thinking Jacob is Esau and getting the special blessing of the first-born.Understandably Esau's mad enough to kill his brother. So Jacob goes off to marry a cousin or two and Esau marries a couple of his other cousins. They sure like to keep it all in the family.
Jacob's ladder is something that comes up in a lot of stories-- just a dream about a ladder into heaven. I don't feel too sorry for Jacob. He's been such a trickster, so when Laban tricks him into marrying Leah and having to work 14 years for Rachel, it's kind of payback time. I DO feel sorry for Leah, though. Why does she have to get stuck marrying the guy who wants her sister. Women don't get much choice, it seems. There's a very interesting book called The Red Tent by Anita Diament based on the story of Leah and Rachel and of poor little Dinah, the only daughter mentioned here. Diament is a scholar of
Jewish and Biblical history, so she brings a lot of interesting background into the story.
Chapter 30: When Rachel has Jacob use her made to give her a baby, the sisters and their maids all end up in competition for Jacob's attentions, and for how many of his boys they can produce. It's a bit like a herd of animals. The idea of a child being born to the handmaid on Rachel's thighs is the basis for Margaret Atwood's chilling book, The Handmaid's Tale.
Jacob does some trickery here to finally get away from his father-in-law, but there's some weird superstitions about breeding sheep. Some of this seems to indicate selective breeding, but the deal about cutting stripes into sticks to make the sheep have spots is more magical/sorcery in nature.
August 12 -- sorry for the big gap. I was on vacation. So now to finish up Genesis with chapters 31-50
It's interesting that Jacob explains himself to Rachel and Leah. Rachel stole the statues of the household gods from her father, so many members of the family must still be idol-worshippers. Again with the deceit-- Rachel keeps her father from searching her tent by claiming she's having her period-- a taboo.
The reunion of Jacob and Esau is interesting-- Jacob is sure Esau is going to hate him, but Esau is quite welcoming. We don't really know what has inspired Esau's change of heart except that he has evidently prospered. The wrestling match that Jacob has with God is just weird. What is the point?
Chapter 34 is a pretty terrible story, I think. This is the only daughter of Jacob that is mentioned, and one of the few women. So the prince wasn't very nice in grabbing Dinah and sleeping with her, but then he falls in love and wants to marry her. The prince's dad offers a huge dowry and even consents to have EVERY MAN IN TOWN circumcised. Now that is a pretty big deal, I think. So what happens? The brothers kill all the men, take all the women prisoners and ransack the town. Nasty. Jacob's sons just seem to be a wild and mean spirited crowd. They kill a whole town over their sister's treatment and then turn around and sell Joseph to slavers. So much for honor! Chapter 38 gives a brief explanation for why Catholicism considers masturbation (onanism) a major sin.
The last 11 chapters all deal with Joseph's rise to power in Egypt and how he deals with his brothers afterward. It's an interesting story and contrasts Joseph with his brothers, since Joseph never seems to go for vengeance, and his brothers always expect him to do so-- even when they don't know who he is. So Joseph prospers by forgiving his brothers, and they don't do as well expecting the revenge that has permeated their lives.